Bawku MP Has No Burkinabe Passport•Says Witness

Adamu Daramani

Nolasco Nyiedu, the Immigration officer who gave evidence at the trial of the Member of Parliament (MP) for Bawku Central, Hon. Adamu Daramani Sakande, in connection with alleged multiple nationalities, has admitted that a document issued by the Burkina Faso authorities which the MP used to travel was “a travel document” not a passport.

The witness said this in an Accra Fast Track High Court on Friday during cross-examination by Yoni Kulendi, counsel for the MP, who asked the witness whether he could say for sure that it was a passport. The immigration officer in charge of Immigration at Kotoka International Airport (KIA) also told the court presided over by Justice Charles Quist that he was not familiar with the requirements of acquiring passports in the United Kingdom (UK).

Nyiedu, who stated that he was once with the Fraud Unit at the Immigration Office and dealt with Alien Passport, Refugees Passport, Emergency Travel Certificates and Laissez Passe, stated that the passport issued to the accused person, Mr. Sakande, by the British authorities, was normally granted to persons seeking asylum or persons with refugee status.

When he was asked to tell the court what features on British travel documents showed whether one was a refugee or not, he said he could not identify. Subsequently, when asked how refugees are identified, he explained that it was not possible for one to know who a refugee was unless that person identified himself or herself with institutions like United Nations High Commission For Refugees among others.

He was further asked if he could determine who an asylum seeker was, to which he replied that one needed a wider background of an individual to determine whether or not that person was an asylum seeker. When Counsel for the accused person asked the witness who a refugee was, he answered by saying a refugee was someone who felt he was not safe in his country and sought protection in another country by fleeing.

The witness said he was familiar with the requirements of acquiring passports in Ghana and when asked what the requirements were, he said one needed a birth certificate, place and date of birth, nationality of parents and noted that that one must be a citizen of a country before one can apply for a passport.

When asked whether that was all one needed to acquire a passport, he said the nationality of the parents of a person who has applied for a visa was equally of importance. The case has been adjourned to August 28, 2009. The MP was ordered to vacate his seat in parliament by an Accra High Court in a default judgment, after a cattle dealer, Sumaila Bielbiel, dragged him to court, accusing him of having the nationality of the UK.

The accused person has been engaged in series of legal battles for an opportunity to put up a defense and produce documents to prove he indeed renounced his British Citizenship before filing to contest as a New Patriotic Party Candidate.

Source: dailyguideghana